She either took her chances and ran off into the unknown or she went with Benjamin into another unknown.
The question was which unknown held the least danger.
Benjamin watched Freya rub her arms as she stared back at him, could see her weighing up her options.
Then her spine straightened and she stepped slowly towards him, holding the spray can outwards, aimed at him.
When she was two metres from him she stopped. ‘If you come within arm’s reach of me I will spray this in your face. If you make any sudden movements I will spray this in your face.’
He believed her. The fear he had glimpsed before she had run had gone. Now there was nothing on her face but cool, hard resolve.
If he’d believed she was a woman to fall into a crying heap at the first sign of trouble he would never have taken this path.
Everything he had learned about her backed his instinct that Freya had grit. Seeing it first-hand pleased him. It made what had to be done easier.
‘I have given you my word that you will come to no harm.’
‘You have already proven yourself a liar. Your word means nothing to me.’
He turned to the open car door. ‘Are you getting in or do I leave you here?’ He didn’t like that he’d had to lie and had swallowed back the bile his lies had produced. That bile was a mere fraction of the sourness that had churned in his guts since he’d accepted the extent of the Casillas brothers’ betrayal.
She glared at him and backed into the car.
By the time Benjamin had folded himself into the back next to her, she had twisted herself against the far door, still aiming the spray can at his face.
‘Don’t come any closer.’
‘If I wanted to hurt you I would have done so already.’
Her jaw clenched and her eyes narrowed in thought but she didn’t lower her arm or relax her hold on the can. He was quite certain that if she were to spray it at him it would temporarily blind him. It would probably be painful.
‘Do you always carry that thing with you?’ he asked after a few minutes of loaded silence had passed while his driver navigated the dark narrow roads that led to his chateau.
‘Yes.’
‘Why?’
She smiled tightly. ‘In case some creep tries to abduct me.’
‘Have you ever used it?’
‘Not in anger but there’s a first time for everything.’
‘Then I shall do my best not to provoke you to use it on me.’
‘You can do that by telling your driver to take me to the nearest airport.’
‘And how will you leave France on a commercial flight without your passport?’
Her lips clamped together at this reminder, the loathing firing from her eyes hot enough to scorch.
The car slowed over a cattle grid, the rattling motion created in the car one Benjamin never grew tired of. It was the motion of being home.
After driving a mile through his thick forest, they went over another cattle grid then stopped for the electric gates to open.
For the first time since they’d got into the car, Freya took her eyes off his face, looking over his shoulder at the view from his window.
Her eyes widened before she blinked and looked back at him.
‘You can put the spray down,’ he informed her nonchalantly. ‘We have arrived.’
His elderly butler greeted them in the courtyard, opening Freya’s door and extending a hand to help her out.
Benjamin got out of his door in time to hear her politely say, ‘Please, can you help me? I’ve been kidnapped. Can you call the police?’
Pierre smiled regretfully. ‘Je ne parle pas anglais, mademoiselle.’
‘Kidnapped! Taken!’ She put her wrists together, clearly trying to convey handcuffs, then when Pierre looked blankly at her, she sighed and put a hand to her ear to mimic a telephone. ‘Telephone? Police? Help!’
While this delightful mime was going on, Benjamin’s driver slowly drove the car out of the courtyard.
‘Pierre doesn’t speak English, ma douce,’ Benjamin said. He’d inherited Pierre when he bought the chateau and hadn’t had the heart to pension him off just because he spoke no other language as all other butlers seemed to do in this day and age.
She glared at him with baleful eyes. ‘I’ll find someone who does.’
‘Good luck with that.’ Only one member of his household staff spoke more than passable English and Freya had just proven she couldn’t speak a word of his own language. ‘Come, let us go in and get settled before we talk. You must be hungry.’
‘I don’t want your food.’
Turning his back to her, he walked up the terracotta steps and into the main entrance of his chateau.
‘Christabel,’ he called, knowing his head housekeeper wouldn’t be far.
No sooner had he finished saying her name than she appeared.
‘Good evening, sir,’ she said in their native tongue with a smile. ‘Did you have a good trip?’
‘I did, thank you. Is everything well here?’
‘Everything is fine and we have prepared the quarters for your guest as instructed.’ Christabel’s eyes flickered over his shoulder as she said this, which he guessed meant Freya had followed him inside, her bare feet muffling the usual clacking sound that could be heard when people entered the great room.
He had a sudden vision of her black high heels discarded on the runway of his airfield, a sharp pang in his chest accompanying it, which he shrugged off.
He would replace them for her.
‘Thank you, Christabel. You can finish for the evening now.’ Turning to Pierre, who had also followed him in, he said, ‘We require a light supper, anything Chef chooses. Bring me a White Russian and Miss Clements a gin and Slimline tonic.’
When his two members of staff had bustled off, he finally looked at his new houseguest and switched back to English. ‘Do you want to talk now or would you like to freshen up first?’
She glared at him. ‘I don’t want to talk but, if you insist, let’s get it over with because I want to go home.’
He held the mutinous black orbs in his. ‘Is it not already obvious to you that you will not be going home tonight, ma douce?’
FREYA STARED INTO the green eyes that only a few hours before she had been afraid to stare too deeply at because of the strange heat gazing into them produced. Now, her only desire was to swing her small bag into his face. She’d put the pepper spray back into it and her fingers itched to take it back out and spray the entire contents at him.
‘When will I be going home?’ she demanded to know.
A single brow rose on his immobile face. ‘That will be determined shortly. Come with me.’
‘Come where?’
‘Somewhere we can talk in comfort.’
He walked off before she could argue. She scowled at his retreating figure but when he went through the huge double doors and disappeared, she quickly got her own legs moving. This chateau...